Augusta applied to study medicine at the University of Pennsylvania but was refused admission. As he was determined to become a physician, Augusta travelled to California and earned the funds necessary to pursue his goal of becoming a doctor. Concerned that he would not be allowed to enroll in medical school in the U.S., he enrolled at Trinity College of the University of Toronto in 1850. He also conducted business as a druggist and chemist. Six years later he received a degree in medicine.

Augusta went to Washington, D.C. and wrote to Abraham Lincoln offering his services as a surgeon and was given a Presidential commission in the Union Army on October 1862. On April 4, 1863 he received a major’s commission as surgeon for African American troops. This made him the United States Army‘s first African American physician out of eight in the Union Army and its highest-ranking African American officer at the time.

Augusta taught anatomy in the recently organized medical department at Howard University from November 8, 1868 to July 1877, becoming the first African American appointed faculty of the school and also of any medical college in the U.S.

He was never a member of the American Medical Association, as he was rejected due to his race. At Augusta’s death in 1890, he became the first black officer buried at Arlington National Cemetery, in a plot set apart from white officers’ graves.

The Akosua Report: Facts on The African Diaspora, is written by Akosua Lowery. Follow her on Twitter @AkosuaLowery.

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TheBurtonWire.com is the premiere online destination for people who think for themselves. This blog offers news from the African Diaspora, culture that is produced by often overlooked populations and opinion that is informed and based on fact. Tired of the onslaught of websites and talking heads that regurgitate what people want to hear, TheBurtonWire.com is a publication that elevates news and perspectives that people need to hear. TheBurtonWire.com is for individual thinkers who understand that they are part of a larger collective. What is this collective? Free thinking people that care about the world, who will not be categorized or boxed in by society or culture and are interested in issues and topics that defy stereotypes and conventional wisdom.

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